doc benway

Nails of the Foo Age!

Estas Tonne

She’s groovy... Flats in a jazz bass sound incredible.

I would advise against sticking the bottom out or leaning forward. Proper alignment is more important than depth of stance. A slight bend in the knees is all that is needed. Some qigong is done in lower stance, such as ma bu, but those stances have different considerations and intentionally engage more muscle tension. Natural standing should not hold tension.

What 3 points?

I would offer that the examples you offer have nothing to do with morality, conventional or otherwise. They are more related to paternalistic and institutionalized control and abuse, often excused by law and masquerading as “morality.” When it comes to the behavior of spiritual masters, there is a saying in the Bön tradition that addresses this. Your view must be as broad as the sky, your behavior as fine as barley flour...

... and you will never not fully be mother nature ...

To me there is nothing more practical and nothing more Daoist than this. The conceptual mind loves to interject itself, and it's certainly a useful tool. Sometimes it's even supportive. Far more often an obstruction or distraction to this direct connection... for me, at least.

Beautifully evocative post ST, thank you for that. I would add trees, plants, bodies of water, mountains, planets, stars, and the elements to that short list... It definitely takes some time and inner work to begin to connect at more subtle levels with less familiar manifestations but, like you point out, there is such richness and unlimited potential in opening ourselves to other forms of life and the natural world. The more I connect with these things, the closer I feel I come to the fundamental essence of inter-being, as Thich Nhat Hanh likes to say, or to the essence of Dao, as might be more appropriate to this thread.

I stumbled across a video today that made me think of this thread. At the risk of perpetuating a deflection of the thread's intent, this is for anyone who doesn't understand the interest in and practice of energetics... Just contemplating this brief video for a few moments helps me to approach feeling and practicing with energetics in a deeper way. It helps to imagine the stillness of water before and after the manifestation of the wave.

and medicinal as it may be, our practice has deeper meaning

I find it interesting that when we experience these positive experiences there is a tendency to look for an outside source or reason. We rarely consider the possibility that it is purely happening in us, our own connection to the source. I'm not denying anyone's experience or explanation, just noticing that we do this.

I remember my teacher talking about method and wisdom several years back. One point he made is that all the schools of (Tibetan) Buddhism agree on what method is. The problem arises when they try to discuss wisdom, that is when all sorts of debate and disagreement arises. And those disagreements can be pretty intense. From the Dzogchen view, this disagreement makes sense because emptiness cannot be defined or conceptualized in any way. So I guess I'm not too surprised when people lean towards nihilism in their "understanding" and "definition" of emptiness because one cannot "understand" or "define" emptiness. This is a very common error in Buddhism, IME, particularly among academics.

“It just means that the "self" is not a fixed, permanent, ego personality that goes on forever.” It goes a bit further than that, I think. What is the self that makes up me? How is that defined? What is it that makes John John? When we look for that we simply can’t find anything specific or inherent, only compounded phenomena and relationships. Our relative experience of self is quite real and yet, at an absolute level, we can’t find any self. If we engage in meditative practice long enough, we begin to identify with a much more pervasive and un-defined sense of self which cannot be captured by mind. If you haven’t done so already, I’d suggest you read through CT’s wonderful thread here. Best thread on the site for me: https://www.thedaobums.com/topic/37270-seeing-recognising-maintaining-ones-enlightening-potential/

I have had a similar experience despite the fact that I tend to be overly intellectual in general. Fortunately, I've been blessed with teachers who have emphasized the experiential path. It's my belief, perhaps other can support or refute it, that the profound philosophical principles we value in Daoism, and other -isms, did not arise from the intellect. Rather they were discovered by practitioners through direct experience. My Daoist and Bön teachers have consistently discouraged too much study and emphasized the value of connecting directly to the source through skillful practice again and again to develop familiarity and confidence. Ultimately we find that everything we need can be found there.

The most important part of a box is inner space...

An alternative way of addressing the issue might be to say - I don't want to be provocative, but I don't find such things to support my own practice and understanding... It gets the point across without invalidating the beliefs and practices of others. What is nonsense to you may be quite supportive, interesting, or stimulating for someone else. When a teaching or practice doesn't resonate with me, rather than concluding it is nonsense I try to remain open. There may be something there that I just don't connect with yet. There may come a time when it's helpful to me. Closing myself off to the possibility only limits my potential. My intention is not to belabor the point but there is simply too little genuine civility and mutual support here. People tend to be quick to invalidate others' perspectives. That is never a good foundation for sharing and building community.

My perspective is a bit different. This is a common misconception but inaccurate. I base this mainly on my own experience. Non-judgmental awareness is perfectly capable of experiencing emotion, pleasure, any experience whatsoever. There’s nothing wrong with experience, it’s what our mind does with it. If we let go of the judgment, we can actually experience things more fully and without the interference of the chatter and the judgment. Ever notice the fullness and authenticity of emotions, happy and sad, that we see in highly advanced practitioners? We can also let things go and be open for the next experience without baggage. Just the opinions of a beginner on the path. Cheers

LIke Apech implies, I'm not sure this is an accurate conclusion. The primary standout result of Tibetan Buddhist monastics relates to fear of self-annihilation. These monastics are deeply trained and committed to make this precious human life useful in working towards liberation. It's no surprise that they take this life very seriously and the sturdy results reflect that. While they train to see the self as an illusion, they respect the two truths and live their live accordingly. Is that truly being "scared of death"? Perhaps, but I'm not convinced by this study that a Tibetan Buddhist monk is necessarily more "scared of death" than say an American businessman or Thervada practitioner. I suspect this is more a measure of how seriously these monks take the opportunities provided by this life to seek liberation. From the article - "When we look at aspects of the fear of death other than self‐annihilation, we find that Buddhist monastics do not fear death more overall."

Buddha is this very Awareness or consciousness which is not modified or corrupted by conceptual thought or artificial constructions or by following after the six sense consciousnesses. It is this. ~ Menri Trizin 33rd, Approaching Dzogchen according to the Athri Cycle

Far better

Thanks for the clarification.

Here is a link to instructions on the 9 Breathings of Purification - https://ligmincha.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/nine-breathings-final-2011.pdf Here is a diagram that’s may help with the visualization - https://ligminchatexas.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/Channels.jpg This alone can be very effective in working with emotional stuff. I worked with neighbors who were dealing with issues around cancer treatment using this technique and it was profoundly effective for them in mobilizing emotional energies. If you want to get into more sophisticated practices, the Tsa Lung are amazing but take some time to understand and feel. There is a great book that covers these methods called Awakening the Sacred Body by Tenzin Wangyal Rinpoche. Alternatively, there’s a free online course that covers them, along with a basic Bön meditation routine here - https://www.ligminchalearning.com/starting-a-meditation-practice/ You will need to sign up but there are no fees. If you need any additional info, please let me know.

I’m curious about this - trance? Care to share any more about your practice? Meditation for me is nothing like a trance, quite the contrary. In the tradition I follow, there are some very effective ways of working with emotional energy. It involves clearing the channels and chakras in the body through practices called the 9 Breathings of Purification and the Five Tsa Lung. These come from the Bön tradition of Tibet. If interested, I can post links to free instruction.